That means we're getting well and truly into the run-up to Christmas - and this is the crossover time when, if you're a supplier rather than a retailer, those last big festive orders are likely to start coming in.
Meanwhile, if you're a direct retailer, you should see a steady stream of buyer interest between now and December as more people get their gift shopping out of the way.
Capitalising on Christmas
The above image is from my June post I Want To Ride My Buy Cycle and shows how searches including the word 'buy' spike in the last quarter of each year as seasonal shopping takes hold of the e-commerce space.
How can you make sure you're ready for this year's rush? The obvious way is to get your search-visible content up to scratch, with the right industry-specific key terms in the right places to attract the search traffic.
Christmas in particular is a good time to try a long-tail search strategy - you can use it alongside existing short-tail keywords, so your existing rankings should not suffer, but don't be afraid to target more specific and descriptive terms.
Some people out there will know exactly what they want for their friends and relatives, and the internet is one of the main places (if not the main place) they'll look.
Ho-Ho-Wholesale
It's not just the present-buying public who up their orders in the run-up to Christmas; retailers the world over will be looking for the right items to flesh out their inventories.
This - as if you needed reminding - includes B2B sales that occur entirely within the e-commerce space. You might even run an affiliate or reseller scheme in which the person who sells the goods never sees them, and you deliver direct.
Whatever your business model, Christmas holds opportunities - fewer people will be spending time out in the sun and far fewer will be on holiday, meaning business opportunities should pick up well before the festive season truly arrives.
SEOsonal Greetings
Yes, I know that's the worst pun of the lot. But it highlights the interplay between the time of year and your site content.
Blogs are particularly handy, because you can simply post a few pieces with seasonal keywords in there, and you've targeted at least some of the potential customer base. If you're operating in a niche, you could quickly see a front-page ranking on Google for terms that were previously nowhere on your site.
If you operate solely with a static site, however, you're in for a slightly more troubled time. Getting season-specific text on there may prove to be a more involved process. That does not make it less worthwhile though - in fact, if you don't have a blog to support your keywording efforts, your main website copy is likely to take on even greater significance.
Take a good look at your website - and ask yourself the following key questions:
- does Christmas present you with season-specific opportunities?
- does your website make the most of these prospects?
